Track-based off-road vehicles provide mobility and versatility to outdoor travelers. These vehicles have low ground pressure and high ground contact area, so they may effectively travel over snow, mud, rocks, and other debris with relative ease compared to other wheeled vehicles. Thus, they are prized for their ability to provide access to wilderness areas that are difficult or impossible to reach otherwise.
Some off-road vehicles are used for amphibious expeditions. They may have a hull that is water-tight and boat-like so that when the vehicle drives into deep water, it may float and be propelled across the water's surface before seamlessly exiting the water and transitioning back to land travel. These vehicles typically have four, six, or eight air-filled off-road tires that are used to propel the vehicle while on land.
Previous attempts to combine the advantages of tracked vehicles with these amphibious vehicles have produced poor results. These modified vehicles typically have an endless track wrapped around the pneumatic wheels on each side of the amphibious vehicle. While this may provide some of the advantages of tracked vehicles to the amphibious vehicles, the amphibious vehicles subsequently have many issues. They need constant maintenance due to slippage between the track and wheels, difficulty in keeping proper air pressure and alignment of the pneumatic wheels, and faults in the mechanical drive system that uses clutches, belts, chains, sprockets, transmission, and axles. They also provide a rough ride for the operator due to the wheels being attached to rigid or semi rigid axles extending through the floating hull of the vehicle, and they have poor traction due to insufficient inner support for the track between the pneumatic wheels. They also have challenges in water egression due to the mechanical drive train passing through the hull of the machines. The unibody construction of these modified amphibious vehicles also limits or eliminates the vehicle's ability to adjust its ground clearance or ride height and can mean that the shape and size of the body is not optimized for stability while floating in water. Thus, many inherent issues with their designs make them clumsy to drive and maintain.
There is therefore a need for improvements to tracked vehicles configured for off-road travel.